Richard Edjericon

Thank you. I'm going to go to the Minister.

Thank you. I'll go to the Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. During my Member's statement, I spoke about Nutrition North and as it costs $2 billion since 2011 and half of that going to the communities throughout the three territories.

Mr. Speaker, my question is to the Premier. The GNWT needs to work closer with the federal government on food insecurities. What action is the Premier taking to assess the Nutrition North shortcoming and to advocate for change in Ottawa? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Madam Chair. Since the 19th Assembly, I've been bringing to this House about the issues of education in our small communities and, in particular in Lutselk'e, where the leadership contacts been saying that they're still waiting to fill positions at the adult education centre. And I brought it here to the House. I raised it on the floor. I was assured that it's going to be looked a the and that position's going to be filled. Here we are now going into the 20th Assembly, a year into the mandate, and yet that position hasn't been filled.

You know, right now as it is, when I first heard...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Yeah, Mr. Speaker, we all know that there is -- there are overhead costs to do business that are unique in the NWT, such as administration and logistics. What is the GNWT doing to make it easier to do businesses in small communities so that Nutrition North subsidies can be more effective? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Northwest Company which runs the stores across the North could be facing a class action lawsuit that was filed in Nunavut. It is alleged the company has been reducing the costs of groceries they sell despite taking tens of millions of dollars in subsidies from the federal Government of Canada through the Nutrition North program. This lawsuit will play out and even malpractice is not proven, but this is another sign that Nutrition North is not working as is intended. There are countless studies which show that the food insecurity has worsened since the program began...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Indigenous communities are opening their own new grocery stores, in particular in Fort Resolution. Will the Premier advocate for these bands to run stores to get Nutrition North subsidies as well while in deliberation with Ottawa? Thank you.

Well, thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I just want to briefly talk about that little 5-year-old boy that we want to bring home to the family and Fort Smith. And I just wanted to ask the Minister now that we know what needs to get done, what can we do now to bring that little boy home? Like you got to remember, this little boy was buried, had no family around, died of probably TB or whatever at the time, but the family wants to have a proper burial now in Fort Smith. I just want to ask the Minister what can we do now to work together in collaboration to bring this little boy home? Thank you...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Earlier I talked about bringing a young child that was buried in Fort Resolution home to Fort Smith. But, Mr. Speaker, right now in our community, the family has reached out to the chief in Fort Resolution to help do that. But we ran into a little bit of a problem now as we went looking into this whole situation about how we're going to exhume the body of the baby and bring him home. But we understand that the GNWT has a policy on archaeological artifacts dating back over 50 years, and I'm not really sure if that applies to cemeteries. So I just want to ask the Minister...

Thank you, Mr. Speaker. As well as you know, in the 19th Assembly, I think it was Bill 85 on the -- where we worked on the UNDRIP file, and we did that for about a year and a half and we finally brought it to the House in the 19th Assembly, and we passed it, and that legislation. So that legislation recognizes and respects the Indigenous governments' culture and values. So I just wanted to ask the Minister now that there's a chance where we could go back and revisit to make -- to modernize this agreement -- or sorry, this new legislation so that we are able to exhume further remains that we...